Crysis 2’s Fancy Graphics Patch Released

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When using the new “Ultra” spec, DX9 platforms will benefit from real-time local reflections and contact shadows. The owners of DX11 platforms, in addition, will be able to enjoy hardware tessellation (requires the installation of the “DX11 Ultra Upgrade”), parallax occlusion mapping and several improvements for shadows, water, particles, depth of field and motion blur.

Err, how could Crysis ever be a tech demo for anything other than consoles when it’s running on DX9 in the age of DX11?
One of 2010’s biggest, most overhyped flops on PC was Crysis 2, I think – looks mediocre, a typical console-port with a multiplayer that’s is still a no-go (admittedly after BF:BC2 it’s hard to come up with a meaningful competitive MP nowadays.)

They had to patch the hell out of this because unlike Crysis 1, this game was meant to run on lesser machines. While some games were built with higher quality assets then downgraded to meet the spec, this one was just okay then upgraded just now.

The realistics will say that it’s due to the lack of time before the deadline for the game came. The conspiracists will tell a tale of Nvidia bribing EA to ensure that CryTek hold back on the DirectX 11 patch. The pessimist will state that it’s yet another reason why CryTek has abandoned PC gamers, while never giving a solid reason as to why it has taken so long. The optimist will enjoy it.

And then there’s those whom angrily hate CryTek for the use of the word ‘gift’ when talking about the graphical upgrades being released.

The update (v1.9) will automatically install on your computer. If it doesn’t already, restart Steam. The DirectX 11 update and the high resolution texture pack is completely optional and works on all versions of the game. Download and install them after your Crysis 2 has been updated to v1.9.

One of the early patches actually reverted those to much more easily understood terms.
They worked fine in Crysis Warhead when they used them as they were in a drop-down menu so you could tell which was which.

Alt-tab after loading the level for the first time, it doubles the framerate.
It looks un-fucking-believable, especially in the night levels. I get about 40 fps on my q6600, 4 GB RAM and GTX 470 at 1920 x 1080. It’s a slight drop from the DX9 version, and there’s a bit more stuttering sometimes.

A much bigger question is: Who cares? Who cares about Contact Shadows and Hardware Tessellation when ultimately the game is just bad. It’s a bland FPS game in an over-saturated market of bland FPS games. Making it a bit more shiny isn’t going to help this ultimately unimpressive game

Crysis 2 was far inferior to Crysis. Sure it was more polished and performed better, but it’s obvious that Crysis was designed to compete with the COD style console shooters, and it suffers because of that with excessive streamlining, smaller more limited levels, less free-form gameplay, worse AI, and less interactivity with the environment.
Graphically I’d also say it’s worse, not due to it being DX9 with lower textures, but due to the excessive post processing and motion-blur, and a weird high-contrast colour palette. Thankfully the latest patch allows you to turn off the worst of the post processing.

“Crysis 2 was far inferior to Crysis. Sure it was more polished and performed better, but it’s obvious that Crysis was designed to compete with the COD style console shooters, and it suffers because of that with excessive streamlining, smaller more limited levels, less free-form gameplay, worse AI, and less interactivity with the environment.”

Completely disagree. The gameplay in Crysis consisted of “Jump on top of the building then down onto the bad guys” or “Run around the building and then shoot the bad guys”. I can’t say that I had fun with Crysis. I much prefer Crysis 2, but then again I also have a sweet gaming computer and consider it my crown jewel.

I know that in my post I contradicted myself somewhat but didn’t really care at the time. Just ignore it for what it is, a ridiculous attempt of mine to summarize my thoughts into a really short text. As English ain’t my primary language this is a certain area I often fail at when trying to convey my thoughts, something all of my wall-of-texts over at SPUF illustrates pretty good. Though practice makes perfect, right?

@Starky:
Work for CryTek…? That was an interesting question… Though I can see that my post portrays a lot of similarities to the fiasco that were BioWare’s employee reviewing Dragon Age 2 at MetaCritics, while calling into question the opinions of the fans.

But no, I do not work for CryTek. I’m actually a mere Swedish student currently studying for a Bachelor’s in game development. Though working for CryTek would probably be really interesting, as I’ve always liked their products (well, not really Far Cry as I never got passed the first encounter with those damn aliens/monsters/whatever).

Though you did give me an idea for a potential side-job while studying… Doing damage-control by being ‘undercover’ online sure would be an interesting experience, as long as I didn’t have to make excuses for failures such as DNF. The excuses for releases such as that would need to be so stupid that it would harm my intelligence.

@Aemony
I only asked if you worked for them because of your comment above about the patch, struck me as community manager like in tone (maybe you have a calling in that area) – it wasn’t really intended as a accusation, well not a hostile one anyway.

I enjoyed Crysis 2 more than 1, one of the main reasons being that I used all the suit modes a lot more. Cloak is as broken either, and although you could probably sneak past pretty much everyone, it’s harder than it was and this actually will come back to bite you.
Also, I actually found the AI to be much better than the first game, aside from the odd time they got caught on the scenery (or in one case, each other, that was weird to say the least), but I’ve seen someone make a tree fall on themselves in the first game so neither’s perfect.
Saying there’s much less “sandboxiness” is I find is a rather silly thing to say, as you get a lot of options of dealing with situations, especially with large areas you get to much around in. About the only thing it loses from the first is that each encounter is more-or-less in a self-contained area, unlike the massive sprawly maps of the early missions of the first game where you could even pick your orders of objectives if you really wanted. Although, Crysis 2 has a lot more verticality to it, which is always a good thing.

I enjoyed both games. But in my opinion the stealth was even more ‘broken’ in the second one. You could use silenced pistols while invisible, meaning you could never be seen and shoot everyone in the head. I don’t see why people say that it’s broken though, as I really enjoy it, and that’s the whole point of a game. You know.. To have fun!

@ Shortwave
Feeling really bad about pointing this out given that I support the general message you’re trying to pass across. THAT SAID, first person shooters have kinda been around since… like… Maze War and Spasm. They were early-mid 70s!

All the same, I do agree that the examples which really definied the genre are Wolfenstein, Doom, Quake (etc.) and you would have been able to play them (maybe not old enough by law but what do parents really know?!).

Anyway – I agree with your point.

@ szlevi
I’m only 21 but still like to think I have fairly good knowledge when it comes to FPS games. You’re comment is somewhat… poorly thought out. After all, it would be fair to argue that someone my age could have been introduced to video games in the Golden Age of FPS? Other than those above, there was also Duke Nukem 3D, Half Life, Battlefield 1942, Goldeneye (I know… a console game!… so shoot me!) and hybrids such as Deus Ex or Theif.

In fact, I’d be hard pushed to find an FPS so fondly remembered (and still played) prior to 1992.

Your argument would probably hold more weight if you went with “15 and under” but even then, it’s a very large generalisation…

Just had a blast through the first two levels, on gtx 460 with all the packs installed and everything set to Ultra the framerate certainly takes a hit, maybe 30fps average and down to as little as 10-15 in combat, but the visual upgrade is extremely noticeable, especially with the hardware tessalation.it’s actually pretty obscene in places, you can actually see each individual brick stick out of a wall for example.

How does performance compare to Metro 2033? I was never sure if the poor performance I got from that maxed was due to the DX11 settings being experimental or my HD6950 not being up to scratch for tesselation and the like.

I’d say the performance i’m getting in C2 is just about playable on my 460gtx with everything maxed, bare in mind however that my monitor is 1440×900 native which is a fairly small resolution by todays standards. Going up to 1080p or above I think the 460 would fall into the “forget about it” category :)

My 5750 struggles a bit, it’s not really playable without getting headache but then the whole system save the CPU is under recommended for both packs being installed (on my HDD not my SSD, 6Gb not 8Gb RAM, 1Gb not 1.5Gb VRAM)

Thanks Daz. I remember the days when everyone was jealous of my 1680×1050. :(

Had a quick glance at a comparison (http://www.hwcompare.com – handy website, I’ve not seen before,) and there is a fairly large performance difference between those two cards. Shouldn’t be any problem then.

It’s like how you can’t order soft drinks in a ‘small’ any more, just a child size and everything has names that are too embarrassing to say. Games should have graphics settings as ‘child’s graphics’ then ‘maximum’ then ‘ultra’ then ‘hyper-ultra’ then ‘double ultra-mega’.

What I’m wondering about the DX11 patch is whether the game will run faster than DX9 on Windows 7 64Bit. I was getting only 30-40fps at 1920×1080 with all settings maxed but with motion blur and AA off with my Q6600 OC’ed to 3Ghz and MSI GTX 460 1GB Cyclone. Since I still dual boot to Windows XP I was able to compare it and i was getting 1/4 more fps.

Before anyone says DX11 cards handle DX 9 poorly, you are wrong. Since the release of Vista and Win7 I have owned and used a Geforce 8800GTS 320MB, 9800GTX 512MB, GTX 460 768MB/1GB, Radeon HD 4200, HD 4650 DDR2, HD 5750. Nearly every DX9 game I have played is faster in XP than Vista/Win7 32/64Bit.

On my Q6600 and GTX 460 1GB, CoD Black Ops run at about 30-40fps in Windows 7, but over 100 in XP. On the flip side, I actually get the same FPS in Bad Company 2 using DX11 as I do on XP but DX10 runs half as slow.

Get ready for a bit of history with my video cards in response to me buying a new video card every year. Because I can.

The 8800GTS was an RMA replacement for my 7900gtx that died. I used it for a year and then I sold the 8800GTS and paid for half of my 9800gtx in 2008. Then my 9800gtx died and In November I bought my GTX 460 1GB to replace it because I knew I was getting an HD 5750 back from the RMA. I sold the HD 5750 after I used it in my HTPC for 3 months. I got the HD 4650 for free from the ATI litigation about HDPC compatibility and used it in my HTPC before the HD 5750 on the motherboard that has the HD 4200 built in. I bought the GTX 460 768MB to replace the HD 4650 because it was crazy cheap and I was sick of dealing with the drivers not functioning correctly every time I plugged in a new monitor or TV or changed multi-monitor settings.

I loved my 9800GTX, it was the XFX Black Edition and played everything great until I got my 1080p monitor and started playing everything at 1080p. The card could handle most of what I played at 1080p but it was already starting to fail and just overheating too often and eventually offed it self. It was an awesome card while it lasted.

My GTX460 is great and don’t plan to buy another video card for 3 years.

Start STEAM and the patch downloads on it’s own. Start game. Stop game and log out again to download DX11 pack. Download DX11 pack. Install. Start game. Select DX11 features. Game requires restart for DX11 features. Get bored of faffing about and play something else.

I fail to see how it’s a bad game. It may not be your preference, but it’s still well-made.
I’m also in the enjoying the gameplay camp, which I hate as it means I can’t claim to be completely unbiased, even when I’m trying to be.

Check here for comparison shots btw.: link to tinyurl.com
The difference Tesselation alone makes looks pretty huge, Depth of Field and added Screen Space Ambient Occlusion like in Witcher 2 to make things “pop” and Screen Space Reflection for added Reflection-y fun. Won’t make the game any less of a “console port” with dumbed down Level design and gameplay and a blatant rip-off of Call of Duty as a multiplayer though.

Nice, those textures help a lot (and without any fps hit). I will replay the game, since I actually enjoyed it quite a bit (certainly more than any CoDs or MoHs). DX11 stuff is ncie too, but not enough to make me sacrifice 60fps. I need that to have pleasant experience.

So is this like the bullshit I had to deal with for Dragon Age 2, where I had to go online and separately download a “hi-rs pack” (for a PC game…wtf!?) that required me to find my credentials for EA, log into the EA site and social network system, then provide a serial/registration number for the game, then figure out the shitty navigation system, then download the file, then run an installer?

Considering that the high resolution textures won’t run unless you have a 64-bit operating system, it’s being released a while after launch, and the fact they are fairly big so a forced download would be unfair to people who can’t even use it, I’d say it’s not unreasonable. This being the higher-than normal resolution textures, the standard ones are pretty damn good by themselves.
Also, they don’t use the EA servers as far as I know, or the at the very least, they use their own section of them, so tons of extra logins are probably not needed.

OK, highest settings dx 11 w medium motion blur, everything else maxed out 1080p on core i7 860/gtx 480 i get 30 to 60 fps. In the wide open areas it went around 30, and an enclosed area (like when you meet gould it was mostly 40 to 60. It never went under 29 fps or over 60, which is weird but whatever. Its probably not worth playing again if you already finished it in dx9 like I did. I still like the muliplayer but I may dial that back to direct x 9 and just make use of the better textures.

Crysis 1 looked better, with lower hardware requirements. And it was a better game too. And to top it all off, it also had a story that made sense instead of a giant pile of retcon and nonsensical “plot”.

It looks like a proper visual update to Crysis now – visually comparable to Warhead, but with better art design, use of color, and post-processing effects.

Compared with the graphics before today, it’s like having fog removed from the screen: everything is much clearer and crisper.
People can pretend that graphics make no difference or they can play the fashionable populist, but at the end of the day the increase in graphical fidelity* does really make a big difference in a first person game.

*Fidelity does not necessarily mean the latest eyecandy, but in the era of consolization, it does at least mean textures and terrain that doesn’t look like smeared diarrhea. Noticing a lot of nice little artistic and design details that were simply lost in the ugliness of shit textures and flat terrain before the update.

This inspired me to jump back into Crysis 2 after, a while back, getting stuck at a helicopter boss battle in a small room; something that manages to combine two of my pet loathings. I got past it by putting the difficulty down, only to find I can’t switch it back up again – foiled! I was a big fan of the first two (Crysis 1 & Warhead( but I just find there’s something not quite as satisfying about 2. I’m putting a new build together this week (i5 2500K/8GB/GTX 560ti/SSD cache) so I’ll probably Crysis 1 on there first to see how it copes…

The fact that it’s just now gotten all its shit in order graphics-wise makes me sad. Crysis was future-proof right out of the box, not several months after launch receiving a patch to do so. Crytek, I am disappoint.